Jimmy Rabbitte of The Commitments returns in the triumphant new novel from the Booker Prize-winning author of Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha Watch for Roddy Doyle's new novel, Smile , coming in October of 2017 Full of the great joy in storytelling that characterizes Roddy Doyle's novels, The Guts catches up with Jimmy Rabbitte--the man who in the 1980s formed the Commitments, a band composed of working-class Irish youths whose mission was to bring soul music to Dublin. Jimmy is now forty-seven, with a loving wife, four kids . . . and colon cancer. The news leaves him shattered and frightened--he isn't dying, he thinks, but he might be. As he battles his illness while running a small music business, he runs into former bandmates, reunites with his brother, and decides to live more in the moment. The Guts is a warm, funny novel about friendship and family, about facing death and opting for life.